Sianim 02 - Wolfsbane

he was anything other than a wolf who followed at your heels?” Her uncle spoke in his native tongue.
    Without replying, Aralorn translated his speech into Rethian for Wolf. She was too tired for verbal battles—though translating wasn’t much better.
    “She found me, and I followed her home,” said Wolf dryly.
    “So why do you need me, child?” Halven switched to Rethian, though his tone lost none of its hostility. “I felt the force of the magic he called when you were imperiled; your shapeshifter is surely as capable as I.”
    “No,” said Wolf.
    “He only knows human magic,” said Aralorn, when it became obvious that Wolf had said all that he would on the matter.
    Her uncle let out a coughing sound and ruffled his feathers. “I am not stupid. No human mage could hold the shape of a wolf for so long without being trapped in his own spelling.”
    “His father, who raised him, was a human mage,” she said cautiously, not wanting to give too much away. “We think his mother was a shapeshifter or some other kind of green mage. His ability to work green magic . . . fluctuates.” She wouldn’t tell her uncle how badly it fluctuated, not now. Perhaps later, when he was in a better mood. “In green magic, he has only the little training that I’ve been able to give him, and you know how poorly trained I am.”
    “Your own fault,” he snapped.
    “Of course,” she said, happy to have distracted him to a more familiar frustration. “Wolf has already looked at the spells holding Father. Perhaps you might be able to tell how they were cast, but neither of us could figure it out. There is this also: Father is guarded by some sort of creature that I have never even heard stories about. We thought you might be able to identify it.”
    “Why didn’t you tell me about all this before?” asked Halven in a dangerously soft voice.
    Tired as she was, Aralorn found the energy to grin.
    “What?” she said. “And use my best ammunition first? I thought that you would be much harder to convince, and I’d have to pull out the shadow-thing to draw you to the keep out of curiosity. I wasn’t counting on Kessenih doing half the work for me.”
    She couldn’t be sure, but she thought she saw an answering amusement rising in her uncle’s eyes.
    “We think,” said Wolf slowly, “that your people have nothing to do with this. If you can banish the creature who guards him, or tell us how to do it, then with luck we can unwork the spell and identify the caster.”
    Halven raised his eyebrows. “I hadn’t heard that you could trace a black spell back to the wizard.”
    “If it is human cast, I can,” said Wolf.
    The shapeshifter cocked his head. “So if I can help you rid the Lyon of this creature, you can deal with the black magic binding him?”
    “If it is black magic, worked by human hands—yes.”
    “I thought,” said Halven with soft intent, “that human mages proscribed black magic. A mage caught using it is killed.”
    “Working black magic is,” replied Wolf. “But unworking it usually requires no blood or death.”
    “You are very familiar with something that is supposed to have been forbidden for so long.”
    “Yes, and you are not the first to note it,” agreed Wolf, without apparent worry, though Aralorn curled her hands into fists. He took such a risk. Her uncle would figure out who he was, and she no longer knew him well enough to predict what Halven would do. If he told any of the humans about it, Wolf would become a target for anyone. The Spymaster, Ren, liked to say that anyone could be killed, given enough time, money, and interest in accomplishing that person’s death.
    “If I am seen by a human mage,” Wolf continued, “he will most certainly attempt to see that I am killed. It is to spare myself needless effort defending myself that I spend so much time as a wolf.”
    The wind had been teasing the treetops, but as the sun moved down and removed that slight source of warmth, it began to blow in earnest once more. Aralorn lost track of the conversation, unable to tell one voice among many. Keeping her face impassive, she slipped her hand onto the curve of Wolf’s elbow and kept her mouth closed for fear of echoing the shrieks reverberating in her head.
    Wolf glanced at her face, then said something to Halven.
    The hawk cocked its head and gave a jerky nod. With a leap and a thrust of wings, it took flight.
    Wolf waited until the hawk was out of sight before turning back to